The Gifted and Talented Child

Who doesn't think their child is a genius? I think my daughter is a genius and if I ever start to doubt it, she has 5 grandparents that will remind me she's a genius.

Okay, okay, my daughter may not be a genius. In fact, there are some days when I think there might be something wrong with her. Just kidding. Maybe.

The truth is, even if my child is Gifted and Talented, I won't know for awhile. I think it would be very hard for me to diagnose her in such a way by the time she reaches pre-school. Even if she reads before she gets to kinder, is that a sign she's a genius? Or a more likely, a sign that I just took the time to teach her phonics starting when she was 2? If she has a love for reading, it may not be an indication of her IQ as much as it may be an indication that she has loving parents who read out loud to her at least twice a day. And if she's two or three years ahead of her peers because of all this, do I want to start teaching her at that level? And even if she does have a high IQ and it's obvious to others, not just those that love her best, what do I do with that??

I've known parents who believe in "acceleration". Put on the gas and let them go as far ahead as they can. Education is a race and the sooner they can graduate High School the better. Skip a few grades because they can handle the work and they love the challenge. I thought I would be one of those, but now I'm not so sure.

I look at it like this: Acceleration v. Digging Deeper. Full Speed Ahead v. Exploration. My experience has been that the happiest students were the ones who were given an age appropriate lesson, but then given permission to "dig deeper". Create a game, a report, a 3-D display, a movie, etc...anything to "hang out" with that topic for awhile and exhaust it until they were satisfied. Children will join the rat race soon enough, yes? Why force them to do it now?

The challenge for me, the teacher, was to do this in a classroom full of 30 kids. More times than not, I did not succeed. But now I am a parent. And maybe my job as a parent is to make my child a life-long lover of learning, genius or not. Maybe it's my job as the parent to take a lesson and find ways to "dig deeper". After all, parents are the best teachers to their children.

More on this as I process. But feel free to give your ideas and comments...